Executive is weary of the judiciary. Judiciary is weary of the executive. The parliament is weary of both, feeling ignored by one and threatened by the other. 'Check and balance' principle is in tatters. Each is over-eager to check the others. Balance has become a casualty. Parliament says it is supreme. Judiciary agrees, but with a caveat: Constitution is more supreme. And, of course, judiciary alone determines what is constitutional.
Parliament says the Executive is accountable to it. Executive agrees, but with a caveat: you can move a no-confidence motion if you have the numbers. And, of course, the constitution prohibits defections. Neither the parliament nor the judiciary has been able to check the excesses or inaction of the executive. They have only allowed it to make a credible case of undue intrusiveness that impedes its functioning.
The bottom line is that we find ourselves in a triangular line of fire, with each pillar of state crying foul and reminding the others to 'remain within their constitutional remit'. Ironically, the pillar with the remit to define 'constitutional remit' is itself being charged of mandate-creep. On the whole quite a paralytic state of affairs, where the only winner is that fourth pillar, the Media, reveling in the plight of the State.
Other than the ever-suffering people, it is the already demoralised civil servants who are bearing the brunt of this game of thrones. Summoned by the courts one day and by parliamentary committees the next day, and having to face their political bosses every day, it has become impossible for them to say the same thing to all three. This crisis of narrative is gleefully picked up by the Media to deliver the coup de gras, leaving the 'steel frame' brittle and incapable of delivering.
Hopelessly caught in this cross fire among the three pillars are the people, whose only fault is demanding legislation that makes their lives better, a competent dispensation of these laws and their fair and timely adjudication. The numbers, of sceptics and non-believers, are growing. They are beginning to question the very idea of democracy. Why live with a system that was designed to ensure no one pillar was too strong but has ended up with each too febrile to deliver?
To them, democracy is a means to an end - greater equity, equality and egalitarianism - and not an end in itself. If our version of democracy has failed to give us the rule of law, and continuing to believe in it would tantamount to triumph of hope over experience, why not try something different?
The holes in our system of democracy are easy to pick. No, the voters are not stupid. Voting on the basis of bradari, waderaism, or whatever, is the effect of a faulty system and not its cause. It is just that they have little to choose from - all candidates are the same, vociferous in their promises and forgetful after the elections. If not much is going to change why not grab whatever little you can? Why waste your vote on someone not likely to win? Maybe, just maybe, voting for the winning side may one day have the favour returned.
Even the political parties believe in the virtues of the local network of influence, which is often a function of money and an 'open house'. They are more likely to award tickets to the more electable than to the more able. Loyalty to the party cause is a devalued currency when pitched against the purchasing power of influence and network.
And hereditary politics is now an accepted norm. It hasn't yet crept into JI and MQM but all others take it in their stride. Gaddi Nashini is not a monopoly of PPP and PML varieties (N, Q and F). They thrive in the jolly company of Wali Khans, Sherpaos, Achakzais, Saifullahs, Ayub Khans, Tareens, Qureshis......
Newness is only in the faces, not lineage. The fractured political system, with little hope of it correcting itself before it is too late, makes the anti-democracy camp echo Oliver Cromwell, "depart, I say; and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go". And they aspire to the kind of caretaker government that Cromwell installed.
Essentially, it is the values versus efficiency argument that drives the democracy sceptics: what good are values (representation, sovereignty of the people) if at the cost of efficiency (good governance, delivering all that the political forces promise but do not)? If anything, prolonged inefficiency destroys the values that democracy claims to fight for. By no means can one assail the democracy-as-a-means argument. It is the alternative that is deeply troubling. Historical evidence challenges it. We have had variants of non-representational government. Each left us worse off than before.
Governing the ungovernable is not the issue. If anything, we are too governable, as all invaders from the Moghuls to the British discovered, and Deputy Commissioners like Ishrat Husain experienced. The issue is not institutions either. Institutions are demand-driven. They, necessarily, have to grow from 'informal institutions' that define the society: sanctions, taboos, customs, traditions, codes of conduct. Formal institutions, as Douglas North explained, are basically a crystallization of informal institutions.
Our issue is that of social cleavage, between the traditional and the elite. The traditional resists the rules of the game that the elite want to foist on them. Traditionalists have the numbers but not the voice. Elite have the voice but it is a voice that does not resonate with the majority. In the name of institutions the elite can subdue the majority but it will always be a pyrrhic victory - until they give ear to the traditionalists and make them partners who agree to 'own' the institutions.
Unsurprisingly, we have come to a state where we are weary of all three pillars. Khaki as the Messiah does not find too many votaries either - repeated appearances have seen to it. We are condemned to live this state of weariness until we recognize elitism cannot masquerade for majoritarianism; indeed, the elite betray a colonial mindset when they try to impose a value system that is alien to the majority. We need a change in our value system. But let's not force it. Let's work on it - through an educational system that promotes shared values. Let's fast track it.
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